New Manti Elementary principal goals are students confidence and character

By Sabrina Winkel

Staff Writer

MANTI—A former fourth grade teacher who says his grandfather inspired him to go into teaching has been named the new principal at Manti Elementary School.

The new principal is David Ipson, who has taught fourth grade at the school for five years and, while teaching, earned his master’s in educational leadership and his administrative credential from Western Governor’s University.

Ipson grew up in Delta and graduated from high school there. He later attended Snow College and went on to Utah State University, where he majored in elementary education.

Ipson says he always wanted to teach. His grandfather was a teacher and strived to help students be their best. Later, his grandfather became a principal.

He says he was pursuing a completely different major at Snow College when he changed his mind and decided to go into teaching “because I love to make a difference, and I love to be around where I can help other people become better.”

The new principal says he has three goals for the students he will oversee as principal. First, he wants them to gain knowledge. Second, he wants them to become confident. And third, he wants them to develop character.

He plans to continue the “Leader-in-Me” program, a model developed by Franklin-Covey Inc. Manti is the only school within several Central Utah counties that has been designated as a Leader-in-Me school.

The program tries to move students from a “fixed mindset” to the “growth mindset, Ipson says. “We are working with all the teachers in training where our focus is on the growth mindset,” he says, “where we learn how to incorporate the growth mindset principles into our classrooms.

“We want our students to know they have that power and the opportunity to want to grow from what they learn, and rise above and become better versions of themselves.”

Education doesn’t pay as much as some careers, he says, but the rewards make up for the lower pay. “Every day I come in and seeing the smiles on the kids’ faces is what makes my job worth it,” he says.

“The biggest challenge I have now is that I have never been a principal, so that’s a big learning curve for me,” he says. “There’s going to be new responsibilities, but that’s going to help me to better understand what my students need.”

Ipson has three kids of his own and they are the ones that keep him going and he enjoys watching them grow and learn.